Systems and methods for managing user subscriptions to content sources

ABSTRACT

Systems and methods are described for a media guidance application (e.g., implemented on a user device) that manages user subscriptions to content sources by modifying content source bundles to tailor them toward user preferences.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This is a non-provisional application of U.S. Provisional ApplicationNo. 62/558,847, filed Sep. 14, 2017, which is hereby incorporated byreference herein in its entirety.

BACKGROUND

Content providers of all types (MSO's, MVPD's, Networks, vMVPD's, OTT's,CE) all provide some form of a packaged offering or content sourcebundles to their subscribers. Those packages often take the form of avariety of themes (basic content, drama package, sports package, kidspackage, etc.). Content providers allow users to subscribe to a givenbundle to access a given set of content sources that are included in theselected content source bundle. This reduces the cost of accessingcontent sources because the user is not given access to all the contentsources, but rather those content sources available in the selected oneof the content source bundles. However, the content source bundles areoften not well aligned with viewer desires, which results in viewershaving to make concession decisions to balance their budget with theirdesired content coverage, and the viewers are often left unsatisfied.The net effect on content providers is that the audience isnon-optimized in terms of content (or channel) coverage, nor in terms ofrevenue extracted from the audience.

SUMMARY

Accordingly, systems and methods are provided for managing usersubscriptions to content sources. The media guidance applicationmodifies content source bundles in order to tailor them towards userpreferences. By aligning content source bundles with viewer desires, themedia guidance application optimizes content coverage for audiences andrevenue generation for content providers.

The media guidance application may store a plurality of content sourcebundles wherein a first content source bundle includes a first subset ofa plurality of content sources and a second content bundle includes asecond subset of the plurality of content sources. The media guidanceapplication may determine that a user has a subscription to the firstcontent source bundle, wherein the subscription enables the user toaccess the first subset of content sources in the first content sourcebundle. The media guidance application may monitor viewing habits of theuser relative to the first subset of content sources in the firstcontent source bundle. The media guidance application may modify thefirst content source bundle to add a first content source from thesecond subset of the content sources in the second content source bundlebased on the viewing habits of the user.

In some aspects, the media guidance application may store a plurality ofcontent source bundles wherein a first content source bundle includes afirst subset of a plurality of content sources and a second contentsource bundle includes a second subset of the plurality of contentsources. For example, the plurality of content source bundles may bevarious packages that a content provider may offer to users (e.g.,economy package, sports package, comedy package, etc.). The plurality ofcontent sources may be all the channels that a content provider offers(e.g., HBO, FOX, ABC, CNN, etc.). Therefore, a subset of the pluralityof content sources may be a selection of the plurality of contentsources that is a part of the content source bundle. For example, FOX,ABC, and CNN may be a subset of the plurality of content sources (e.g.,HBO, FOX, ABC, CNN, etc.) and may be included in a content bundle (e.g.,economy package).

The media guidance application may determine that a user has asubscription to the first content bundle, wherein the subscriptionenables the user to access the first subset of content sources in thefirst content source bundle. For example, the user may have asubscription to the first content source bundle, the economy package.Suppose that the economy package includes the channels ESPN, ABC, andDisney Channel. By having a subscription to the economy package, theuser can therefore access ESPN, ABC, and Disney Channel.

The media guidance application may monitor the viewing habits of theuser relative to the first subset of content sources in the firstcontent source bundle. For example, the media guidance application maytrack the viewing history of the user relative to the first contentbundle. In some embodiments, monitoring the viewing habits comprisesdetermining from which content sources in the first content sourcebundle the user accesses content frequently. For example, the mediaguidance application may determine how often the user accesses thecontent sources and the time spent on each. Suppose a user has asubscription to the economy package, which consists of ESPN, ABC, andDisney Channel. The media guidance application may have monitored thatthe user views content on ESPN between 4:00 pm and 5:00 pm on Mondays,Wednesdays and Thursdays, and views content on ABC between 6:00 pm and9:00 pm during the weekend. The media guidance application may havefurther monitored that the user does not view content on Disney Channel.Therefore, the media guidance application may determine that the userfrequently accesses content on ESPN and ABC.

The media guidance application may identify, based on the viewinghabits, a viewing schedule of the user associated with a first contentsource of the content sources in the first content source bundle. Insome embodiments, the viewing schedule specifies a repeated time windowin which the user accesses content from the first content source bundlemore than a threshold number of days. For example, after monitoring theviewing habits of the user, the media guidance application may determinethat the user tends to watch content on ESPN during the weekdays between4:00 pm and 5:00 pm, along with content on ABC between 6:00 pm and 9:00pm during the weekend. The media guidance application may also identifya trend that the user revisits ESPN to view content between 11:00 pm and11:30 pm during the weekends. Based on the viewing habits, the mediaguidance application may identify that the user does not access DisneyChannel and therefore Disney Channel is not a part of the user's viewingschedule.

The media guidance application may search, based on a user profile, fora given plurality of content sources that are in the second subset ofthe plurality of content sources and are not in the first subset of theplurality of content sources and that match the user profile of theuser. For example, suppose that the second content source bundle is thesports package which consists of content sources ESPN, MLB Network, andNBA TV. The media guidance application may determine that MLB Networkand NBA TV are not in the first content source bundle and ESPN is a partof both the first and second content source bundles. Furthermore, themedia guidance application may retrieve a user profile that indicatesthat the user consistently watches ESPN, a content source dedicated tosports content. Therefore, the media guidance application may determinethat the user prefers watching sports content. Since the channels MLBNetwork and NBA TV also feature sports content, the media guidanceapplication may determine that the MLB Network and NBA TV are contentsources that match the user profile.

The media guidance application may identify content transmitted by thegiven plurality of content sources that match the user profile. Forexample, the content may be a television show, a movie, a sports game,etc., that is featured on the content source. Continuing the previousexample, when watching ESPN and ABC, the user may specifically like towatch basketball games featuring the Los Angeles Lakers. The userprofile may contain the user's viewing history, which consists ofseveral references to the Los Angeles Lakers. These references mayappear in the metadata of the content viewed by the user. For example,the content listing may state “Los Angeles Lakers vs. New York Knicks,”“San Antonio Spurs vs. Los Angeles Lakers,” and “History of the LosAngeles Lakers.” The media guidance application may further monitorcontent being transmitted by MLB Network and NBA TV. The media guidanceapplication may determine that MLB Network does not feature any contentthat matches the user profile. However, it may find content such as “TheGreatest Players of the Los Angeles Lakers” that is featured on NBA TV.Since the user profile indicates that the user prefers to watch contentrelated to the Los Angeles Lakers, the media guidance application mayidentify the content as matching the user profile.

The media guidance application may determine a transmission schedule ofthe identified content. In some embodiments, the transmission schedulecomprises scheduling information specifying a transmission schedule ofeach media asset transmitted by the given plurality of content sources.For example, “The Greatest Players of the Los Angeles Lakers” may be aweekly documentary series that may discuss the careers of famous playersof the Los Angeles Lakers. The media guidance application may determinethat the show is transmitted on NBA TV on Thursdays between 5:30 pm and6:30 pm.

The media guidance application may compare the transmission schedule ofthe identified content with the viewing schedule of the user. Forexample, the media guidance application may determine that the userconsistently watches television between 4:00 pm and 9:00 pm on weekdaysevery week. As previously noted, the user accesses content on ESPNbetween 4:00 pm and 5:00 pm. The media guidance application maydetermine that the transmission schedule of the content on NBA TV, “TheGreatest Players of the Los Angeles Lakers,” does not conflict with thetransmission schedule of the content the user accesses on ESPN. Thus,the user can potentially view the content on NBA TV.

The media guidance application may select a second content source of thegiven plurality of content sources based on the comparison. In someembodiments, the media guidance application selects the second contentsource in response to determining that the transmission schedule of theidentified content transmitted by the second content source does notoverlap with the viewing schedule of the user associated with the firstcontent source in the first content source bundle. For example, upondetermining that the transmission schedules of “The Greatest Players ofthe Los Angeles Lakers” and the content the user accesses on ESPN do notconflict, the media guidance application may select NBA TV.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may determine thatthe transmission schedule of the identified content transmitted by thesecond content source overlaps with the viewing schedule of the userassociated with the content in the first content source bundle. Inresponse, the media guidance application may request user confirmationto select the second content source. The media guidance application mayfurther select the second content source in response to userconfirmation to select the second content source. For example, if theuser accesses content on ESPN between 4:00 pm and 5:00 pm and the “TheGreatest Players of the Los Angeles Lakers” is transmitted on NBA TVbetween 4:30 pm and 5:30 pm, the media guidance application maydetermine that there is a thirty-minute overlap between the user'sviewing schedule and the transmission schedule of the content source.The media guidance application may then prompt the user that NBA TVfeatures “The Greatest Players of the Los Angeles Lakers,” which istransmitted at 4:30 pm every Thursday. The media guidance applicationmay request that the user decide if he/she wants to select NBA TV to addto the user's content source bundle.

The media guidance application may modify the first content sourcebundle to add the selected second content source. For example, the mediaguidance application may add NBA TV to the user's economy package.Therefore, the modified economy package would consist of ESPN, ABC, NBATV, and Disney Channel. In some embodiments, the media guidanceapplication may remove a third content source from the first subset ofthe first content source bundle based on the modification to the firstcontent source bundle. In the previous example, it was noted that theuser does not access Disney Channel and content featured on DisneyChannel is not a part of the user's viewing schedule. In response, themedia guidance application may remove Disney Channel from the user'smodified economy package. In some embodiments, the first content sourcebundle is associated with a first cost and the second content sourcebundle is associated with a second cost. The media guidance applicationmay adjust the first cost based on modifying the first content sourcebundle. For example, suppose that the stand-alone economy package costs$50 monthly. Suppose that each content source (e.g., channel) costs $5.Therefore, adding a content source to the content source bundleincreases the monthly cost by $5, and removing a content source reducesthe monthly cost by $5. In the given scenario, adding NBA TV to theuser's economy package increases the monthly cost to $55. If the mediaguidance application further removes Disney Channel, the monthly costreturns to $50.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may determine that apercentage of the content sources in the first content source bundleviewed by the user is less than a threshold. In response to determiningthat the percentage is less than the threshold, the media guidanceapplication may modify the first content source bundle. For example, theuser may be subscribed to the sports package. Suppose that the sportspackage contains five content sources (e.g., channels). The user may beaccessing only one channel and may choose not to access the remainingchannels because the respective content of the latter is not of interestto the user. Therefore, the media guidance application may determinefrom the viewing schedule of the user that only 20% of the channels arebeing accessed. Suppose that the threshold is set to 60% (i.e., threechannels out of five are being accessed to view content). The mediaguidance application may determine that because the user views only 20%of the first content source bundle, a value less than the 60% threshold,the first content source bundle needs to be modified. As discussedpreviously, modifying a content source bundle may involve adding contentsources, removing content sources, or swapping content sources fromother content source bundles.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may characterize theuser based on the viewing habits. The media guidance application mayidentify a second user based on the characterization of the user andenable the second user to subscribe to the modified first content sourcebundle in response to identifying the second user based on thecharacterization. For example, the user's viewing habits may consist ofseveral basketball games. The media guidance application maycharacterize the user as a fan of sports. Furthermore, the user's firstcontent source bundle may be a modified first content bundle thatheavily focuses on sports-related content sources. The media guidanceapplication may identify a second user that is also characterized as asports fan and enable him/her to subscribe to the modified first contentsource bundle.

It should be noted that the systems, methods, apparatuses, and/oraspects described above may be applied to, or used in accordance with,other systems, methods, apparatuses, and/or aspects described in thisdisclosure.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The above and other objects and advantages of the disclosure will beapparent upon consideration of the following detailed description, takenin conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which like referencecharacters refer to like parts throughout, and in which:

FIGS. 1, 2 and 3 show illustrative examples of display screens generatedby a media guidance application in accordance with some embodiments ofthe disclosure;

FIG. 4 is a block diagram of an illustrative user equipment device inaccordance with some embodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 5 is a block diagram of an illustrative media system in accordancewith some embodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 6 is a flowchart of an illustrative process for managing usersubscriptions to content sources in accordance with some embodiments ofthe disclosure;

FIG. 7 is a flowchart of a detailed illustrative process for managinguser subscriptions to content sources in accordance with someembodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 8 is a flowchart of an illustrative process for determining usersubscription to a content source bundle in accordance with someembodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 9 is a flowchart of an illustrative process for identifying contentthat matches the user profile in accordance with some embodiments of thedisclosure;

FIG. 10 is a flowchart of an illustrative process for selecting thesecond content source in accordance with some embodiments of thedisclosure;

FIG. 11 is a flowchart of an illustrative process for modifying thefirst content source bundle in accordance with some embodiments of thedisclosure;

FIG. 12 is a flowchart of an illustrative process for enabling a seconduser to subscribe to the modified first content source bundle inaccordance with some embodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 13 is a flowchart of an illustrative process for identifying aviewing schedule of the user associated with a first content source inaccordance with some embodiments of the disclosure; and

FIG. 14 is a flowchart of an illustrative process for determining atransmission schedule of the identified content in accordance with someembodiments of the disclosure.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Systems and methods are described to manage user subscriptions tocontent sources. The media guidance application modifies content sourcebundles in order to tailor them towards user preferences. By aligningcontent source bundles with viewer desires, the media guidanceapplication optimizes both content coverage for audiences and revenuegeneration for content providers.

Consider a scenario in which a user is subscribing to a channel packageoffered by a digital content provider (e.g., Time Warner Cable). Supposethat Time Warner Cable offers several unique channel packages (e.g.,economy package, silver package, gold package, etc.). Some of thechannels may be offered in multiple packages, while some channels areexclusive to specific packages. The user cannot determine which packageto subscribe to because some channel packages feature channels that theuser desires to watch, while other channels are of no interest to theuser. Suppose that one package (e.g., a platinum package) exists withall of the channels offered by Time Warner Cable, but the user simplycannot afford the package. Even if the platinum package features all ofthe channels that the user plans to view, it may also include severalchannels that the user does not want to view. Therefore, a subscriptionto the platinum package may not be cost-effective because the user mayend up accessing only a small percentage of the package. Furthermore,the user may desire to pay an amount for the subscription that isproportional to the percentage of access (e.g., if the user consistentlyaccesses only 20% of the channels in a package, he/she should be billed20% of the complete cost of the package). Suppose the user decides tosettle on a bundle that features only some of the channels that he/shedesires to access. The user may instead rely on the media guidanceapplication to create a modified channel package that includes channelsrelevant to the user and to adjust the cost of the package accordingly.

The media guidance application may store a plurality of content sourcebundles wherein a first content source bundle includes a first subset ofa plurality of content sources and a second content bundle includes asecond subset of the plurality of content sources. A content source maybe a source that transmits or broadcasts content to a plurality of usersat a scheduled time, or an on-demand source that allows the user toselect which content the user wants to receive. For example, a contentsource can be a television channel with scheduled television programs. Acontent source bundle may be defined as a collection of content sources.For example, a content source bundle may be a package of multipletelevision channels and on-demand sources. The media guidanceapplication may determine that a user has a subscription to the firstcontent source bundle, wherein the subscription enables the user toaccess the first subset of content sources in the first content sourcebundle. The media guidance application may monitor viewing habits of theuser relative to the first subset of content sources in the firstcontent source bundle. Viewing habits include, but are not limited to,types of content viewed, time spent viewing content, frequency ofviewing content, and method of access (e.g., on smartphone, television,computer device, etc.). The media guidance application may modify thefirst content source bundle to add a first content source from thesecond subset of the content sources in the second content source bundlebased on the viewing habits of the user.

The systems and methods may be implemented via an interactive mediaguidance application running on a user device, a remote server, oranother suitable device. The interactive media guidance application maybe implemented partially on multiple devices such that some portions ofthe interactive media guidance application are executed on one devicewhile other portions of the interactive media guidance application areexecuted on another device.

The amount of content available to users in any given content deliverysystem can be substantial. Consequently, many users desire a form ofmedia guidance through an interface that allows users to efficientlynavigate content selections and easily identify content that they maydesire. An application that provides such guidance is referred to hereinas an interactive media guidance application or, sometimes, a mediaguidance application or a guidance application.

Interactive media guidance applications may take various forms dependingon the content for which they provide guidance. One typical type ofmedia guidance application is an interactive television program guide.Interactive television program guides (sometimes referred to aselectronic program guides) are well-known guidance applications that,among other things, allow users to navigate among and locate many typesof content or media assets. Interactive media guidance applications maygenerate graphical user interface screens that enable a user to navigateamong, locate and select content. As referred to herein, the terms“media asset” and “content” should be understood to mean anelectronically consumable user asset, such as television programming, aswell as pay-per-view programs, on-demand programs (as in video-on-demand(VOD) systems), Internet content (e.g., streaming content, downloadablecontent, Webcasts, etc.), video clips, audio, content information,pictures, rotating images, documents, playlists, websites, articles,books, electronic books, blogs, chat sessions, social media,applications, games, and/or any other media or multimedia and/orcombination of the same. Guidance applications also allow users tonavigate among and locate content. As referred to herein, the term“multimedia” should be understood to mean content that utilizes at leasttwo different content forms described above, for example, text, audio,images, video, or interactivity content forms. Content may be recorded,played, displayed or accessed by user equipment devices, but can also bepart of a live performance.

The media guidance application and/or any instructions for performingany of the embodiments discussed herein may be encoded on computerreadable media. Computer readable media includes any media capable ofstoring data. The computer readable media may be transitory, including,but not limited to, propagating electrical or electromagnetic signals,or may be non-transitory, including, but not limited to, volatile andnon-volatile computer memory or storage devices such as a hard disk,floppy disk, USB drive, DVD, CD, media cards, register memory, processorcaches, Random Access Memory (“RAM”), etc.

With the advent of the Internet, mobile computing, and high-speedwireless networks, users are accessing media on user equipment deviceson which they traditionally did not. As referred to herein, the phrase“user equipment device,” “user equipment,” “user device,” “electronicdevice,” “electronic equipment,” “media equipment device,” or “mediadevice” should be understood to mean any device for accessing thecontent described above, such as a television, a Smart TV, a set-topbox, an integrated receiver decoder (IRD) for handling satellitetelevision, a digital storage device, a digital media receiver (DMR), adigital media adapter (DMA), a streaming media device, a DVD player, aDVD recorder, a connected DVD, a local media server, a BLU-RAY player, aBLU-RAY recorder, a personal computer (PC), a laptop computer, a tabletcomputer, a WebTV box, a personal computer television (PC/TV), a PCmedia server, a PC media center, a hand-held computer, a stationarytelephone, a personal digital assistant (PDA), a mobile telephone, aportable video player, a portable music player, a portable gamingmachine, a smart phone, or any other television equipment, computingequipment, or wireless device, and/or combination of the same. In someembodiments, the user equipment device may have a front facing screenand a rear facing screen, multiple front screens, or multiple angledscreens. In some embodiments, the user equipment device may have a frontfacing camera and/or a rear facing camera. On these user equipmentdevices, users may be able to navigate among and locate the same contentavailable through a television. Consequently, media guidance may beavailable on these devices, as well. The guidance provided may be forcontent available only through a television, for content available onlythrough one or more of other types of user equipment devices, or forcontent available both through a television and one or more of the othertypes of user equipment devices. The media guidance applications may beprovided as on-line applications (i.e., provided on a web-site), or asstand-alone applications or clients on user equipment devices. Variousdevices and platforms that may implement media guidance applications aredescribed in more detail below.

One of the functions of the media guidance application is to providemedia guidance data to users. As referred to herein, the phrase “mediaguidance data” or “guidance data” should be understood to mean any datarelated to content or data used in operating the guidance application.For example, the guidance data may include program information, guidanceapplication settings, user preferences, user profile information, medialistings, media-related information (e.g., broadcast times, broadcastchannels, titles, descriptions, ratings information (e.g., parentalcontrol ratings, critic's ratings, etc.), genre or category information,actor information, logo data (for broadcasters' or providers' logos,etc.), media format (e.g., standard definition, high definition, 3D,etc.), on-demand information, blogs, websites, and any other type ofguidance data that is helpful for a user to navigate among and locatedesired content selections.

Suppose that a content provider (e.g., Time Warner Cable) has sevenunique content source bundles (e.g., channel packages). The user has asubscription to one of the channel packages which features fourteenchannels. These channels include Disney Channel, Nickelodeon, CartoonNetwork, MTV, VH1, Spike, Oxygen, etc. The media guidance applicationstores the content source bundles offered by Time Warner Cable andbegins to monitor the user's viewing activity to determine viewinghabits. The media guidance application may determine that the userprefers viewing content on channels such as Disney Channel, VH1, andMTV, and does not view content on channels such as Spike at all. Themedia guidance application may retrieve the user's profile and furtheranalyze the user's viewing history. The media guidance application maydetermine that the user's viewing schedule involves viewing content onMTV and VH1 during evenings on a daily basis, while viewing content onDisney Channel on weekend mornings. Based on the metadata associatedwith the content viewed by the user, the media guidance application maydetermine that the user prefers watching content associated with musicand animation. The media guidance application may then search forcontent sources in another content source bundle that are not in theuser's content source bundle but that match the user's preference. Themedia guidance application may identify Music Choice, which belongs in aseparate content source bundle offered by Time Warner Cable.Furthermore, the media guidance application may identify content onMusic Choice that matches the user profile. For example, the content maybe a show that features music videos from Disney movies that airs onweekend afternoons. The media guidance application may determine thatthe user's viewing schedule does not conflict with the scheduledtransmission of the content. Therefore, the media guidance applicationmay suggest adding Music Choice to the user's content source bundle. Insome embodiments, the media guidance application may generate, fordisplay, all of the available content source bundles with theirrespective content sources and highlight suggestions.

FIG. 1 shows an illustrative example of a display screen 100 generatedby the interactive media guidance application in accordance with someembodiments of the disclosure. In the example, the interactive mediaguidance application is displaying all seven of the content sourcebundles (e.g., Bundle 1, Bundle 2, etc.) offered by the contentprovider. Each content source bundle has multiple content sources listedalongside. For example, Bundle 5 has content sources including AdultSwim, Cartoon Network, Showtime, etc.

The first content source bundle 110 represents the content source bundlefor which the user has a subscription. Accordingly, it is titled “MyBundle.” In this example, the first content source bundle has not yetbeen modified by the media guidance application. It contains channelsincluding Disney Channel, Nickelodeon, MTV, VH1, Spike, etc. As proposedpreviously, suppose that the user has simply settled for this bundlebecause it features some channels of interest and is affordable for theuser. The user consistently watches content on Disney Channel, MTV, andVH1, but only occasionally watches content on the remaining channels. Inaddition, the user rarely watches content on Spike. The media guidanceapplication may search for alternative content sources in the othercontent source bundles.

The second content source bundle 120 represents and alternative bundlefrom which the media guidance application may potentially find contentsources that match the user's preferences. It is important to note thatvarious content source bundles may vary in size. For example, the secondcontent source contains more channels than the first content source.Content sources may also be shared among different bundles. For example,the content source Disney Channel appears in both the first and secondcontent source bundles. The media guidance application may search forunique content sources that do not appear in the first content sourcebundle. For example, Music Choice does not appear in the first contentsource bundle.

The media guidance application may monitor the viewing habits of theuser relative to the first subset of content sources in the firstcontent source bundle. For example, the media guidance application maytrack the viewing history of the user relative to the first contentbundle. For example, the media guidance application may analyze howoften the user accesses the content sources and the time spent on each.In this case, the media guidance application may have monitored that theuser views content on MTV between 5:00 pm and 6:00 pm and views contenton VH1 between 8:00 pm and 9:00 pm on weekdays on his/her television.The media guidance application may have further monitored that the userviews content on Disney Channel on the weekends between 10:00 am and11:00 am. The content that the user views may range from music videos,animated shows and Disney movies to documentaries about various musicartists. Furthermore, the user may sporadically watch other channelssuch as Nickelodeon and Nick Jr. The media guidance application maydetermine that the user has not accessed the channel Spike. Based onthese viewing habits, the media guidance application may determine thatthe user prefers watching content related to music and animation.

The recommended content source 130 represents a second content sourcethat matches the user profile and is not already in the first contentsource bundle. For example, Music Choice may be a content source thatthe matches the user's profile because it features content gearedtowards music. Furthermore, Music Choice may feature a specific contentthat more appropriately matches the user's preferences. Based on theuser profile, the media guidance application may attempt to identifycontent that features music, animation, and Disney. If Music Choice hasa show “Disney Music Videos” that is broadcasted between 1:00 pm and1:30 pm on weekends, the media guidance application may determine that“Disney Music Videos” matches the user's profile and does not overlapwith the user's viewing schedule associated with content sources fromthe first content source bundle.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may analyze metadataand media settings associated with the content viewed by the user todetermine the user's viewing habits. For example, the user may viewcontent on a certain content source. The media guidance application mayretrieve metadata associated with the content being viewed by the user.This metadata may include, but is not limited to, content descriptions,keywords, themes, genre labels and subtitles. It should be noted thatviewing habits are not necessarily limited to themes or keywords such as“music,” “animation,” “Disney,” etc. For example, the user may set themedia settings by turning on Spanish subtitles or Spanish audio. Themedia guidance application may thus determine that the user prefers toview content in the Spanish language and match content sources such asTelemundo that feature shows in Spanish, with the user profile. Inaddition, the user may view a lot of movies instead of television shows.Even if the user does not have a preference of genre, the media guidanceapplication may match content sources such as HBO and Showtime, whichprimarily feature movies, with the user profile.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may identify asecond content source based on the ratings and popularity of the secondcontent source. For example, the media guidance application may noticethat the user profile has sporadic preferences. The user may watch verylittle content, or may not prefer a specific type of genre. Furthermore,the media guidance application may note that the user tends to watchcontent at specific times (e.g., weekday evenings), but does not watchcontent completely (e.g., frequently changes among content sources). Theuser may simply not be satisfied with the selection of content sources.In response, the media guidance application may search for content thatis popular (i.e., highly watched and highly rated by viewers). Forexample, the media guidance application may refer to the Internet toretrieve content ratings and viewership sizes. The media guidanceapplication may refer to a threshold rating and a threshold viewershipsize to determine if the content is popular (e.g., determines that thecontent's rating and viewership size exceed the respective thresholds).The media guidance application may also have a popular contentthreshold. The popular content threshold may be the amount of uniquecontent, which is deemed popular by the media guidance application, thatis needed for a content source to qualify as being popular. For example,suppose that the media guidance application determines that the content“Game of Thrones,” which is featured on the content source HBO, has acontent rating of 4.5 out of 5 and has a viewership size of 10 milliondaily viewers. If the threshold rating is 4 out of 5 and the thresholdviewership size is 5 million daily viewers, the media guidanceapplication may determine that “Game of Thrones” is a popular show. Themedia guidance application may also determine that “Last Week Tonight”is another show on HBO that qualifies as being popular due its ratingand viewership size. Suppose that the popular content threshold is two.The media guidance application may then determine that HBO has at leasttwo popular shows (e.g., meets the popular content threshold) and is nota part of the user's first content source bundle. The media guidanceapplication then may select HBO as a second content source.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may identify asecond content source based on the user's location. For example, if theuser lives in New York City and watches sports content, the mediaguidance application may identify YES Network, a channel that focuses onthe New York Yankees (i.e., a baseball team associated with New YorkCity), as a possible candidate for the user's first content sourcebundle. Furthermore, the user may view content on his/her mobile device.Mobile devices may track the user's location and store this informationin the user profile. The media guidance application may notice that theuser regularly visits several comedy clubs and may identify ComedyCentral, a content source focused on comedy, as a possible candidate forthe user's first content source bundle.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may refer to theuser's browsing history to identify a second content source. Forexample, the user may search for food recipes on the Internet throughhis/her mobile device or Smart TV. The media guidance application mayidentify keywords such as “food” and “recipes” to identify Food Network,a content source focused on food preparation, as a possible candidatefor the user's first content source bundle.

Once the media guidance application has identified a second contentsource as a possible candidate to add to the first content sourcebundle, the media guidance application may identify specific contentfeatured in the second content source that the user may wish to viewbased on his/her user profile. The media guidance application mayretrieve the transmission schedule of the content and determine if thetransmission schedule overlaps with the viewing schedule of the user. Insome embodiments, the media guidance application selects the secondcontent source in response to determining that the transmission scheduleof the identified content transmitted by the second content source doesnot overlap with the viewing schedule. Whereas in some embodiments, themedia guidance application may determine that the transmission scheduleof the identified content transmitted by the second content sourceoverlaps with the viewing schedule of the user associated with thecontent in the first content source bundle. In response, the mediaguidance application may request user confirmation to select the secondcontent source. The media guidance application may further select thesecond content source in response to user confirmation to select thesecond content source.

In FIG. 1 , the recommended content source 130 can therefore be selectedby the media guidance application because it matches the user's profileand features content with a transmission schedule that may not conflictwith the user's viewing schedule. The media guidance application maythen add the recommended content source 104 to the first content sourcebundle.

The removable content source 140 represents a content source that theuser does not access. In the previous example, the user did not viewcontent on Spike. Spike may be a channel that the user has purchased inthe bundle, but its removal will not affect the user's viewing schedule.Therefore, the media guidance application may remove the content sourcefrom the user's first content source bundle.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may replace theremovable content source with another content source from the secondcontent source bundle. For example, if the user does not view content onSpike, the media guidance application may replace Spike with Bravo, acontent source found in Bundle 1. Even if Bravo does not match the userprofile, the swap can allow the user to access content that he/she maynot previously have been aware of, but may potentially prefer.

In some embodiments, the user may require that the media guidanceapplication request confirmation from the user before adding or removingcontent sources. For example, the display screen 100 may serve as arecommendation aggregator and the user may select the removable contentsource 140 to confirm removal or may select the recommended contentsource 130 to confirm the addition. The recommended content source maybe distinguishable from the other content sources by an identifier(e.g., green font, green outline, a star, a circle, etc.). The removablecontent source may also be distinguishable by an identifier (e.g., redfont, red outline, a star, a circle, etc.).

In some embodiments, the user may allow the media guidance applicationto automatically add or remove content sources. For example, the displayscreen 100 may serve as a summary of the changes made to the user'sfirst content source bundle. The user may refer to the display screen100 to determine the new set of content sources that the user has accessto.

In some embodiments, the first content source bundle is associated witha first cost and the second content source bundle is associated with asecond cost. The media guidance application may adjust the first costbased on modifying the first content source bundle. For example, supposethat the user's first content source bundle costs $50 monthly. Supposethat each content source (e.g., channel) costs $5. Therefore, by addingthe recommended content source 130 (e.g., Music Choice), the contentsource bundle increases the monthly cost by $5. Removing the removablecontent source 140 (e.g., Spike) may reduce the monthly cost by $5. Insome embodiments, the prices of the content sources may be writtenalongside each content source on the display screen 100.

FIG. 2 shows illustrative grid of a program listings display 200arranged by time and channel that also enables access to different typesof content in a single display. Display 200 may include grid 202 with:(1) a column of channel/content type identifiers 204, where eachchannel/content type identifier (which is a cell in the column)identifies a different channel or content type available; and (2) a rowof time identifiers 206, where each time identifier (which is a cell inthe row) identifies a time block of programming. Grid 202 also includescells of program listings, such as program listing 208, where eachlisting provides the title of the program provided on the listing'sassociated channel and time. With a user input device, a user can selectprogram listings by moving highlight region 210. Information relating tothe program listing selected by highlight region 210 may be provided inprogram information region 212. Region 212 may include, for example, theprogram title, the program description, the time the program is provided(if applicable), the channel the program is on (if applicable), theprogram's rating, and other desired information.

In addition to providing access to linear programming (e.g., contentthat is scheduled to be transmitted to a plurality of user equipmentdevices at a predetermined time and is provided according to aschedule), the media guidance application also provides access tonon-linear programming (e.g., content accessible to a user equipmentdevice at any time and is not provided according to a schedule).Non-linear programming may include content from different contentsources including on-demand content (e.g., VOD), Internet content (e.g.,streaming media, downloadable media, etc.), locally stored content(e.g., content stored on any user equipment device described above orother storage device), or other time-independent content. On-demandcontent may include movies or any other content provided by a particularcontent provider (e.g., HBO On Demand providing “The Sopranos” and “CurbYour Enthusiasm”). HBO ON DEMAND is a service mark owned by Time WarnerCompany L.P. et al. and THE SOPRANOS and CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM aretrademarks owned by the Home Box Office, Inc. Internet content mayinclude web events, such as a chat session or Webcast, or contentavailable on-demand as streaming content or downloadable content throughan Internet web site or other Internet access (e.g. FTP).

Grid 202 may provide media guidance data for non-linear programmingincluding on-demand listing 214, recorded content listing 216, andInternet content listing 218. A display combining media guidance datafor content from different types of content sources is sometimesreferred to as a “mixed-media” display. Various permutations of thetypes of media guidance data that may be displayed that are differentthan display 200 may be based on user selection or guidance applicationdefinition (e.g., a display of only recorded and broadcast listings,only on-demand and broadcast listings, etc.). As illustrated, listings214, 216, and 218 are shown as spanning the entire time block displayedin grid 202 to indicate that selection of these listings may provideaccess to a display dedicated to on-demand listings, recorded listings,or Internet listings, respectively. In some embodiments, listings forthese content types may be included directly in grid 202. Additionalmedia guidance data may be displayed in response to the user selectingone of the navigational icons 220. (Pressing an arrow key on a userinput device may affect the display in a similar manner as selectingnavigational icons 220.)

Display 200 may also include video region 222, and options region 226.Video region 222 may allow the user to view and/or preview programs thatare currently available, will be available, or were available to theuser. The content of video region 222 may correspond to, or beindependent from, one of the listings displayed in grid 202. In someembodiments, display 200 may include a selectable option (not shown) toaccess a display of a list of scheduled recordings. For example, themedia guidance application may generate for display the list ofscheduled recordings that is similar to a display generated for displayin response to a selection of third selectable option 128 of FIG. 1 . Insome embodiments, the display 110 of FIG. 1 may be generated for displayover grid display 200 upon invoking the display 200, instead of over avideo of a media asset. Grid displays including a video region aresometimes referred to as picture-in-guide (PIG) displays. PIG displaysand their functionalities are described in greater detail in Satterfieldet al. U.S. Pat. No. 6,564,378, issued May 13, 2003 and Yuen et al. U.S.Pat. No. 6,239,794, issued May 29, 2001, which are hereby incorporatedby reference herein in their entireties. PIG displays may be included inother media guidance application display screens of the embodimentsdescribed herein.

Options region 226 may allow the user to access different types ofcontent, media guidance application displays, and/or media guidanceapplication features. Options region 226 may be part of display 200 (andother display screens described herein), or may be invoked by a user byselecting an on-screen option or pressing a dedicated or assignablebutton on a user input device. The selectable options within optionsregion 226 may concern features related to program listings in grid 202or may include options available from a main menu display. Featuresrelated to program listings may include searching for other air times orways of receiving a program, recording a program, enabling seriesrecording of a program, setting program and/or channel as a favorite,purchasing a program, or other features. Options available from a mainmenu display may include search options, VOD options, parental controloptions, Internet options, cloud-based options, device synchronizationoptions, second screen device options, options to access various typesof media guidance data displays, options to subscribe to a premiumservice, options to edit a user's profile, options to access a browseoverlay, or other options.

The media guidance application may be personalized based on a user'spreferences. A personalized media guidance application allows a user tocustomize displays and features to create a personalized “experience”with the media guidance application. This personalized experience may becreated by allowing a user to input these customizations and/or by themedia guidance application monitoring user activity to determine varioususer preferences. Users may access their personalized guidanceapplication by logging in or otherwise identifying themselves to theguidance application. Customization of the media guidance applicationmay be made in accordance with a user profile. The customizations mayinclude varying presentation schemes (e.g., color scheme of displays,font size of text, etc.), aspects of content listings displayed (e.g.,only HDTV or only 3D programming, user-specified broadcast channelsbased on favorite channel selections, re-ordering the display ofchannels, recommended content, etc.), desired recording features (e.g.,recording or series recordings for particular users, recording quality,etc.), parental control settings, customized presentation of Internetcontent (e.g., presentation of social media content, e-mail,electronically delivered articles, etc.) and other desiredcustomizations.

The media guidance application may allow a user to provide user profileinformation or may automatically compile user profile information. Themedia guidance application may, for example, monitor the content theuser accesses and/or other interactions the user may have with theguidance application. For example, the media guidance application maydetermine through monitoring content the user access, the preferencehierarchy of teams that was discussed in reference to the selection ofsecond selectable option 126 in FIG. 1 . Additionally, the mediaguidance application may obtain all or part of other user profiles thatare related to a particular user (e.g., from other web sites on theInternet the user accesses, such as www.allrovi.com, from other mediaguidance applications the user accesses, from other interactiveapplications the user accesses, from another user equipment device ofthe user, etc.), and/or obtain information about the user from othersources that the media guidance application may access. As a result, auser can be provided with a unified guidance application experienceacross the user's different user equipment devices. This type of userexperience is described in greater detail below in connection with FIG.5 . Additional personalized media guidance application features aredescribed in greater detail in Ellis et al., U.S. Patent ApplicationPublication No. 2005/0251827, filed Jul. 11, 2005, Boyer et al., U.S.Pat. No. 7,165,098, issued Jan. 16, 2007, and Ellis et al., U.S. PatentApplication Publication No. 2002/0174430, filed Feb. 21, 2002, which arehereby incorporated by reference herein in their entireties.

Another display arrangement for providing media guidance is shown inFIG. 3 . Video mosaic display 300 includes selectable options 302 forcontent information organized based on content type, genre, and/or otherorganization criteria. In display 300, television listings option 304 isselected, thus providing listings 306, 308, 310, and 312 as broadcastprogram listings. In some embodiments, the display 110 of FIG. 1 may begenerated for display over grid display 300 upon invoking the display300, instead of over a video of a media asset. In display 300 thelistings may provide graphical images including cover art, still imagesfrom the content, video clip previews, live video from the content, orother types of content that indicate to a user the content beingdescribed by the media guidance data in the listing. Each of thegraphical listings may also be accompanied by text to provide furtherinformation about the content associated with the listing. For example,listing 308 may include more than one portion, including media portion314 and text portion 316. Media portion 314 and/or text portion 316 maybe selectable to view content in full-screen or to view informationrelated to the content displayed in media portion 314 (e.g., to viewlistings for the channel that the video is displayed on).

The listings in display 300 are of different sizes (i.e., listing 306 islarger than listings 308, 310, and 312), but if desired, all thelistings may be the same size. Listings may be of different sizes orgraphically accentuated to indicate degrees of interest to the user orto emphasize certain content, as desired by the content provider orbased on user preferences. Various systems and methods for graphicallyaccentuating content listings are discussed in, for example, Yates, U.S.Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0153885, filed Nov. 12, 2009,which is hereby incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.

Users may access content and the media guidance application (and itsdisplay screens described above and below) from one or more of theiruser equipment devices. FIG. 4 shows a generalized embodiment ofillustrative user equipment device 400. More specific implementations ofuser equipment devices are discussed below in connection with FIG. 5 .User equipment device 400 may receive content and data via input/output(hereinafter “I/O”) path 402. I/O path 402 may provide content (e.g.,broadcast programming, on-demand programming, Internet content, contentavailable over a local area network (LAN) or wide area network (WAN),and/or other content) and data to control circuitry 404, which includesprocessing circuitry 406 and storage 408. Control circuitry 404 may beused to send and receive commands, requests, and other suitable datausing I/O path 402. I/O path 402 may connect control circuitry 404 (andspecifically processing circuitry 406) to one or more communicationspaths (described below). I/O functions may be provided by one or more ofthese communications paths, but are shown as a single path in FIG. 4 toavoid overcomplicating the drawing.

Control circuitry 404 may be based on any suitable processing circuitrysuch as processing circuitry 406. As referred to herein, processingcircuitry should be understood to mean circuitry based on one or moremicroprocessors, microcontrollers, digital signal processors,programmable logic devices, field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs),application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs), etc., and may includea multi-core processor (e.g., dual-core, quad-core, hexa-core, or anysuitable number of cores) or supercomputer. In some embodiments,processing circuitry may be distributed across multiple separateprocessors or processing units, for example, multiple of the same typeof processing units (e.g., two Intel Core i7 processors) or multipledifferent processors (e.g., an Intel Core i5 processor and an Intel Corei7 processor). In some embodiments, control circuitry 404 executesinstructions for a media guidance application stored in memory (i.e.,storage 408). Specifically, control circuitry 404 may be instructed bythe media guidance application to perform the functions discussed aboveand below. For example, the media guidance application may provideinstructions to control circuitry 404 to generate the media guidancedisplays. In some implementations, any action performed by controlcircuitry 404 may be based on instructions received from the mediaguidance application.

In client-server based embodiments, control circuitry 404 may includecommunications circuitry suitable for communicating with a guidanceapplication server or other networks or servers. The instructions forcarrying out the above mentioned functionality may be stored on theguidance application server. Communications circuitry may include acable modem, an integrated services digital network (ISDN) modem, adigital subscriber line (DSL) modem, a telephone modem, Ethernet card,or a wireless modem for communications with other equipment, or anyother suitable communications circuitry. Such communications may involvethe Internet or any other suitable communications networks or paths(which is described in more detail in connection with FIG. 5 ). Inaddition, communications circuitry may include circuitry that enablespeer-to-peer communication of user equipment devices, or communicationof user equipment devices in locations remote from each other (describedin more detail below).

Memory may be an electronic storage device provided as storage 408 thatis part of control circuitry 404. As referred to herein, the phrase“electronic storage device” or “storage device” should be understood tomean any device for storing electronic data, computer software, orfirmware, such as random-access memory, read-only memory, hard drives,optical drives, digital video disc (DVD) recorders, compact disc (CD)recorders, BLU-RAY disc (BD) recorders, BLU-RAY 3D disc recorders,digital video recorders (DVR, sometimes called a personal videorecorder, or PVR), solid state devices, quantum storage devices, gamingconsoles, gaming media, or any other suitable fixed or removable storagedevices, and/or any combination of the same. Storage 408 may be used tostore various types of content described herein as well as mediaguidance data described above. Nonvolatile memory may also be used(e.g., to launch a boot-up routine and other instructions). Cloud-basedstorage, described in relation to FIG. 5 , may be used to supplementstorage 408 or instead of storage 408.

Control circuitry 404 may include video generating circuitry and tuningcircuitry, such as one or more analog tuners, one or more MPEG-2decoders or other digital decoding circuitry, high-definition tuners, orany other suitable tuning or video circuits or combinations of suchcircuits. Encoding circuitry (e.g., for converting over-the-air, analog,or digital signals to MPEG signals for storage) may also be provided.Control circuitry 404 may also include scaler circuitry for upconvertingand downconverting content into the preferred output format of the userequipment 400. Circuitry 404 may also include digital-to-analogconverter circuitry and analog-to-digital converter circuitry forconverting between digital and analog signals. The tuning and encodingcircuitry may be used by the user equipment device to receive and todisplay, to play, or to record content. The tuning and encodingcircuitry may also be used to receive guidance data. The circuitrydescribed herein, including for example, the tuning, video generating,encoding, decoding, encrypting, decrypting, scaler, and analog/digitalcircuitry, may be implemented using software running on one or moregeneral purpose or specialized processors. Multiple tuners may beprovided to handle simultaneous tuning functions (e.g., watch and recordfunctions, picture-in-picture (PIP) functions, multiple-tuner recording,etc.). If storage 408 is provided as a separate device from userequipment 400, the tuning and encoding circuitry (including multipletuners) may be associated with storage 408.

A user may send instructions to control circuitry 404 using user inputinterface 410. User input interface 410 may be any suitable userinterface, such as a remote control, mouse, trackball, keypad, keyboard,touch screen, touchpad, stylus input, joystick, voice recognitioninterface, or other user input interfaces. Display 412 may be providedas a stand-alone device or integrated with other elements of userequipment device 400. For example, display 412 may be a touchscreen ortouch-sensitive display. In such circumstances, user input interface 410may be integrated with or combined with display 412. Display 412 may beone or more of a monitor, a television, a liquid crystal display (LCD)for a mobile device, amorphous silicon display, low temperature polysilicon display, electronic ink display, electrophoretic display, activematrix display, electro-wetting display, electrofluidic display, cathoderay tube display, light-emitting diode display, electroluminescentdisplay, plasma display panel, high-performance addressing display,thin-film transistor display, organic light-emitting diode display,surface-conduction electron-emitter display (SED), laser television,carbon nanotubes, quantum dot display, interferometric modulatordisplay, or any other suitable equipment for displaying visual images.In some embodiments, display 412 may be HDTV-capable. In someembodiments, display 412 may be a 3D display, and the interactive mediaguidance application and any suitable content may be displayed in 3D. Avideo card or graphics card may generate the output to the display 412.The video card may offer various functions such as accelerated renderingof 3D scenes and 2D graphics, MPEG-2/MPEG-4 decoding, TV output, or theability to connect multiple monitors. The video card may be anyprocessing circuitry described above in relation to control circuitry404. The video card may be integrated with the control circuitry 404.Speakers 414 may be provided as integrated with other elements of userequipment device 400 or may be stand-alone units. The audio component ofvideos and other content displayed on display 412 may be played throughspeakers 414. In some embodiments, the audio may be distributed to areceiver (not shown), which processes and outputs the audio via speakers414.

The guidance application may be implemented using any suitablearchitecture. For example, it may be a stand-alone applicationwholly-implemented on user equipment device 400. In such an approach,instructions of the application are stored locally (e.g., in storage408), and data for use by the application is downloaded on a periodicbasis (e.g., from an out-of-band feed, from an Internet resource, orusing another suitable approach). Control circuitry 404 may retrieveinstructions of the application from storage 408 and process theinstructions to generate any of the displays discussed herein. Based onthe processed instructions, control circuitry 404 may determine whataction to perform when input is received from input interface 410. Forexample, movement of a cursor on a display up/down may be indicated bythe processed instructions when input interface 410 indicates that anup/down button was selected.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application is a client-serverbased application. Data for use by a thick or thin client implemented onuser equipment device 400 is retrieved on-demand by issuing requests toa server remote to the user equipment device 400. In one example of aclient-server based guidance application, control circuitry 404 runs aweb browser that interprets web pages provided by a remote server. Forexample, the remote server may store the instructions for theapplication in a storage device. The remote server may process thestored instructions using circuitry (e.g., control circuitry 404) andgenerate the displays discussed above and below. The client device mayreceive the displays generated by the remote server and may display thecontent of the displays locally on equipment device 400. This way, theprocessing of the instructions is performed remotely by the server whilethe resulting displays are provided locally on equipment device 400.Equipment device 400 may receive inputs from the user via inputinterface 410 and transmit those inputs to the remote server forprocessing and generating the corresponding displays. For example,equipment device 400 may transmit a communication to the remote serverindicating that an up/down button was selected via input interface 410.The remote server may process instructions in accordance with that inputand generate a display of the application corresponding to the input(e.g., a display that moves a cursor up/down). The generated display isthen transmitted to equipment device 400 for presentation to the user.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application is downloaded andinterpreted or otherwise run by an interpreter or virtual machine (runby control circuitry 404). In some embodiments, the guidance applicationmay be encoded in the ETV Binary Interchange Format (EBIF), received bycontrol circuitry 404 as part of a suitable feed, and interpreted by auser agent running on control circuitry 404. For example, the guidanceapplication may be an EBIF application. In some embodiments, theguidance application may be defined by a series of JAVA-based files thatare received and run by a local virtual machine or other suitablemiddleware executed by control circuitry 404. In some of suchembodiments (e.g., those employing MPEG-2 or other digital mediaencoding schemes), the guidance application may be, for example, encodedand transmitted in an MPEG-2 object carousel with the MPEG audio andvideo packets of a program.

User equipment device 400 of FIG. 4 can be implemented in system 500 ofFIG. 5 as user television equipment 502, user computer equipment 504,wireless user communications device 506, or any other type of userequipment suitable for accessing content, such as a non-portable gamingmachine. For simplicity, these devices may be referred to hereincollectively as user equipment or user equipment devices, and may besubstantially similar to user equipment devices described above. Userequipment devices, on which a media guidance application may beimplemented, may function as a standalone device or may be part of anetwork of devices. Various network configurations of devices may beimplemented and are discussed in more detail below.

A user equipment device utilizing at least some of the system featuresdescribed above in connection with FIG. 4 may not be classified solelyas user television equipment 502, user computer equipment 504, or awireless user communications device 506. For example, user televisionequipment 502 may, like some user computer equipment 504, beInternet-enabled allowing for access to Internet content, while usercomputer equipment 504 may, like some television equipment 502, includea tuner allowing for access to television programming. The mediaguidance application may have the same layout on various different typesof user equipment or may be tailored to the display capabilities of theuser equipment. For example, on user computer equipment 504, theguidance application may be provided as a web site accessed by a webbrowser. In another example, the guidance application may be scaled downfor wireless user communications devices 506.

In system 500, there is typically more than one of each type of userequipment device but only one of each is shown in FIG. 5 to avoidovercomplicating the drawing. In addition, each user may utilize morethan one type of user equipment device and also more than one of eachtype of user equipment device.

In some embodiments, a user equipment device (e.g., user televisionequipment 502, user computer equipment 504, wireless user communicationsdevice 506) may be referred to as a “second screen device.” For example,a second screen device may supplement content presented on a first userequipment device. The content presented on the second screen device maybe any suitable content that supplements the content presented on thefirst device. In some embodiments, the second screen device provides aninterface for adjusting settings and display preferences of the firstdevice. In some embodiments, the second screen device is configured forinteracting with other second screen devices or for interacting with asocial network. The second screen device can be located in the same roomas the first device, a different room from the first device but in thesame house or building, or in a different building from the firstdevice.

The user may also set various settings to maintain consistent mediaguidance application settings across in-home devices and remote devices.Settings include those described herein, as well as channel and programfavorites, programming preferences that the guidance applicationutilizes to make programming recommendations, display preferences, andother desirable guidance settings. For example, if a user sets a channelas a favorite on, for example, the web site www.allrovi.com on theirpersonal computer at their office, the same channel would appear as afavorite on the user's in-home devices (e.g., user television equipmentand user computer equipment) as well as the user's mobile devices, ifdesired. Therefore, changes made on one user equipment device can changethe guidance experience on another user equipment device, regardless ofwhether they are the same or a different type of user equipment device.In addition, the changes made may be based on settings input by a user,as well as user activity monitored by the guidance application.

The user equipment devices may be coupled to communications network 514.Namely, user television equipment 502, user computer equipment 504, andwireless user communications device 506 are coupled to communicationsnetwork 514 via communications paths 508, 510, and 512, respectively.Communications network 514 may be one or more networks including theInternet, a mobile phone network, mobile voice or data network (e.g., a4G or LTE network), cable network, public switched telephone network, orother types of communications network or combinations of communicationsnetworks. Paths 508, 510, and 512 may separately or together include oneor more communications paths, such as, a satellite path, a fiber-opticpath, a cable path, a path that supports Internet communications (e.g.,IPTV), free-space connections (e.g., for broadcast or other wirelesssignals), or any other suitable wired or wireless communications path orcombination of such paths. Path 512 is drawn with dotted lines toindicate that in the exemplary embodiment shown in FIG. 5 it is awireless path and paths 508 and 510 are drawn as solid lines to indicatethey are wired paths (although these paths may be wireless paths, ifdesired).

Communications with the user equipment devices may be provided by one ormore of these communications paths, but are shown as a single path inFIG. 5 to avoid overcomplicating the drawing.

Although communications paths are not drawn between user equipmentdevices, these devices may communicate directly with each other viacommunication paths, such as those described above in connection withpaths 508, 510, and 512, as well as other short-range point-to-pointcommunication paths, such as USB cables, IEEE 1394 cables, wirelesspaths (e.g., Bluetooth, infrared, IEEE 802-11x, etc.), or othershort-range communication via wired or wireless paths. BLUETOOTH is acertification mark owned by Bluetooth SIG, INC. The user equipmentdevices may also communicate with each other directly through anindirect path via communications network 514.

System 500 includes content source 516 and media guidance data source518 coupled to communications network 514 via communication paths 520and 522, respectively. Paths 520 and 522 may include any of thecommunication paths described above in connection with paths 508, 510,and 512.

Communications with the content source 516 and media guidance datasource 518 may be exchanged over one or more communications paths, butare shown as a single path in FIG. 5 to avoid overcomplicating thedrawing. In addition, there may be more than one of each of contentsource 516 and media guidance data source 518, but only one of each isshown in FIG. 5 to avoid overcomplicating the drawing. (The differenttypes of each of these sources are discussed below.) If desired, contentsource 516 and media guidance data source 518 may be integrated as onesource device. Although communications between sources 516 and 518 withuser equipment devices 502, 504, and 506 are shown as throughcommunications network 514, in some embodiments, sources 516 and 518 maycommunicate directly with user equipment devices 502, 504, and 506 viacommunication paths (not shown) such as those described above inconnection with paths 508, 510, and 512.

Content source 516 may include one or more types of content distributionequipment including a television distribution facility, cable systemheadend, satellite distribution facility, programming sources (e.g.,television broadcasters, such as NBC, ABC, HBO, etc.), intermediatedistribution facilities and/or servers, Internet providers, on-demandmedia servers, and other content providers. NBC is a trademark owned bythe National Broadcasting Company, Inc., ABC is a trademark owned by theAmerican Broadcasting Company, Inc., and HBO is a trademark owned by theHome Box Office, Inc. Content source 516 may be the originator ofcontent (e.g., a television broadcaster, a Webcast provider, etc.) ormay not be the originator of content (e.g., an on-demand contentprovider, an Internet provider of content of broadcast programs fordownloading, etc.). Content source 516 may include cable sources,satellite providers, on-demand providers, Internet providers,over-the-top content providers, or other providers of content. Contentsource 516 may also include a remote media server used to storedifferent types of content (including video content selected by a user),in a location remote from any of the user equipment devices. Systems andmethods for remote storage of content, and providing remotely storedcontent to user equipment are discussed in greater detail in connectionwith Ellis et al., U.S. Pat. No. 7,761,892, issued Jul. 20, 2010, whichis hereby incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.

Media guidance data source 518 may provide media guidance data, such asthe media guidance data described above. Media guidance data may beprovided to the user equipment devices using any suitable approach. Insome embodiments, the guidance application may be a stand-aloneinteractive television program guide that receives program guide datavia a data feed (e.g., a continuous feed or trickle feed). Programschedule data and other guidance data may be provided to the userequipment on a television channel sideband, using an in-band digitalsignal, using an out-of-band digital signal, or by any other suitabledata transmission technique. Program schedule data and other mediaguidance data may be provided to user equipment on multiple analog ordigital television channels.

In some embodiments, guidance data from media guidance data source 518may be provided to users' equipment using a client-server approach. Forexample, a user equipment device may pull media guidance data from aserver, or a server may push media guidance data to a user equipmentdevice. In some embodiments, a guidance application client residing onthe user's equipment may initiate sessions with source 518 to obtainguidance data when needed, e.g., when the guidance data is out of dateor when the user equipment device receives a request from the user toreceive data. Media guidance may be provided to the user equipment withany suitable frequency (e.g., continuously, daily, a user-specifiedperiod of time, a system-specified period of time, in response to arequest from user equipment, etc.). Media guidance data source 518 mayprovide user equipment devices 502, 504, and 506 the media guidanceapplication itself or software updates for the media guidanceapplication.

In some embodiments, the media guidance data may include viewer data.For example, the viewer data may include current and/or historical useractivity information (e.g., what content the user typically watches,what times of day the user watches content, whether the user interactswith a social network, at what times the user interacts with a socialnetwork to post information, what types of content the user typicallywatches (e.g., pay TV or free TV), mood, brain activity information,etc.). The media guidance data may also include subscription data. Forexample, the subscription data may identify to which sources or servicesa given user subscribes and/or to which sources or services the givenuser has previously subscribed but later terminated access (e.g.,whether the user subscribes to premium channels, whether the user hasadded a premium level of services, whether the user has increasedInternet speed). In some embodiments, the viewer data and/or thesubscription data may identify patterns of a given user for a period ofmore than one year. The media guidance data may include a model (e.g., asurvivor model) used for generating a score that indicates a likelihooda given user will terminate access to a service/source. For example, themedia guidance application may process the viewer data with thesubscription data using the model to generate a value or score thatindicates a likelihood of whether the given user will terminate accessto a particular service or source. In particular, a higher score mayindicate a higher level of confidence that the user will terminateaccess to a particular service or source. Based on the score, the mediaguidance application may generate promotions that entice the user tokeep the particular service or source indicated by the score as one towhich the user will likely terminate access.

Media guidance applications may be, for example, stand-aloneapplications implemented on user equipment devices. For example, themedia guidance application may be implemented as software or a set ofexecutable instructions which may be stored in storage 408, and executedby control circuitry 404 of a user equipment device 400. In someembodiments, media guidance applications may be client-serverapplications where only a client application resides on the userequipment device, and server application resides on a remote server. Forexample, media guidance applications may be implemented partially as aclient application on control circuitry 404 of user equipment device 400and partially on a remote server as a server application (e.g., mediaguidance data source 518) running on control circuitry of the remoteserver. When executed by control circuitry of the remote server (such asmedia guidance data source 518), the media guidance application mayinstruct the control circuitry to generate the guidance applicationdisplays and transmit the generated displays to the user equipmentdevices. The server application may instruct the control circuitry ofthe media guidance data source 518 to transmit data for storage on theuser equipment. The client application may instruct control circuitry ofthe receiving user equipment to generate the guidance applicationdisplays.

Content and/or media guidance data delivered to user equipment devices502, 504, and 506 may be over-the-top (OTT) content. OTT contentdelivery allows Internet-enabled user devices, including any userequipment device described above, to receive content that is transferredover the Internet, including any content described above, in addition tocontent received over cable or satellite connections. OTT content isdelivered via an Internet connection provided by an Internet serviceprovider (ISP), but a third party distributes the content. The ISP maynot be responsible for the viewing abilities, copyrights, orredistribution of the content, and may only transfer IP packets providedby the OTT content provider. Examples of OTT content providers includeYOUTUBE, NETFLIX, and HULU, which provide audio and video via IPpackets. Youtube is a trademark owned by Google Inc., Netflix is atrademark owned by Netflix Inc., and Hulu is a trademark owned by Hulu,LLC. OTT content providers may additionally or alternatively providemedia guidance data described above. In addition to content and/or mediaguidance data, providers of OTT content can distribute media guidanceapplications (e.g., web-based applications or cloud-based applications),or the content can be displayed by media guidance applications stored onthe user equipment device. In some embodiments, the OTT sources mayinclude Internet data sources such as RSS feeds, social media sources,news sources, or other sources that are updated at a more frequentinterval than conventional media guidance data. For example, the OTTsources may include a database from which blobs of data (e.g.,javascript object notation (JSON) data, or any other suitable dataformat) for sporting events may be queried and retrieved by userequipment devices 402, 404, and 406.

Media guidance system 500 is intended to illustrate a number ofapproaches, or network configurations, by which user equipment devicesand sources of content and guidance data may communicate with each otherfor the purpose of accessing content and providing media guidance. Theembodiments described herein may be applied in any one or a subset ofthese approaches, or in a system employing other approaches fordelivering content and providing media guidance. The following fourapproaches provide specific illustrations of the generalized example ofFIG. 5 .

In one approach, user equipment devices may communicate with each otherwithin a home network. User equipment devices can communicate with eachother directly via short-range point-to-point communication schemesdescribed above, via indirect paths through a hub or other similardevice provided on a home network, or via communications network 514.Each of the multiple individuals in a single home may operate differentuser equipment devices on the home network. As a result, it may bedesirable for various media guidance information or settings to becommunicated between the different user equipment devices. For example,it may be desirable for users to maintain consistent media guidanceapplication settings on different user equipment devices within a homenetwork, as described in greater detail in Ellis et al., U.S. PatentPublication No. 2005/0251827, filed Jul. 11, 2005. Different types ofuser equipment devices in a home network may also communicate with eachother to transmit content. For example, a user may transmit content fromuser computer equipment to a portable video player or portable musicplayer.

In a second approach, users may have multiple types of user equipment bywhich they access content and obtain media guidance. For example, someusers may have home networks that are accessed by in-home and mobiledevices. Users may control in-home devices via a media guidanceapplication implemented on a remote device. For example, users mayaccess an online media guidance application on a website via a personalcomputer at their office, or a mobile device such as a PDA orweb-enabled mobile telephone. The user may set various settings (e.g.,recordings, reminders, or other settings) on the online guidanceapplication to control the user's in-home equipment. The online guidemay control the user's equipment directly, or by communicating with amedia guidance application on the user's in-home equipment. Varioussystems and methods for user equipment devices communicating, where theuser equipment devices are in locations remote from each other, isdiscussed in, for example, Ellis et al., U.S. Pat. No. 8,046,801, issuedOct. 25, 2011, which is hereby incorporated by reference herein in itsentirety.

In a third approach, users of user equipment devices inside and outsidea home can use their media guidance application to communicate directlywith content source 516 to access content. Specifically, within a home,users of user television equipment 502 and user computer equipment 504may access the media guidance application to navigate among and locatedesirable content. Users may also access the media guidance applicationoutside of the home using wireless user communications devices 506 tonavigate among and locate desirable content.

In a fourth approach, user equipment devices may operate in a cloudcomputing environment to access cloud services. In a cloud computingenvironment, various types of computing services for content sharing,storage or distribution (e.g., video sharing sites or social networkingsites) are provided by a collection of network-accessible computing andstorage resources, referred to as “the cloud.” For example, the cloudcan include a collection of server computing devices, which may belocated centrally or at distributed locations, that provide cloud-basedservices to various types of users and devices connected via a networksuch as the Internet via communications network 514. These cloudresources may include one or more content sources 516 and one or moremedia guidance data sources 518. In addition or in the alternative, theremote computing sites may include other user equipment devices, such asuser television equipment 502, user computer equipment 504, and wirelessuser communications device 506. For example, the other user equipmentdevices may provide access to a stored copy of a video or a streamedvideo. In such embodiments, user equipment devices may operate in apeer-to-peer manner without communicating with a central server.

The cloud provides access to services, such as content storage, contentsharing, or social networking services, among other examples, as well asaccess to any content described above, for user equipment devices.Services can be provided in the cloud through cloud computing serviceproviders, or through other providers of online services. For example,the cloud-based services can include a content storage service, acontent sharing site, a social networking site, or other services viawhich user-sourced content is distributed for viewing by others onconnected devices. These cloud-based services may allow a user equipmentdevice to store content to the cloud and to receive content from thecloud rather than storing content locally and accessing locally-storedcontent.

A user may use various content capture devices, such as camcorders,digital cameras with video mode, audio recorders, mobile phones, andhandheld computing devices, to record content. The user can uploadcontent to a content storage service on the cloud either directly, forexample, from user computer equipment 504 or wireless usercommunications device 506 having content capture feature. Alternatively,the user can first transfer the content to a user equipment device, suchas user computer equipment 504. The user equipment device storing thecontent uploads the content to the cloud using a data transmissionservice on communications network 514. In some embodiments, the userequipment device itself is a cloud resource, and other user equipmentdevices can access the content directly from the user equipment deviceon which the user stored the content.

Cloud resources may be accessed by a user equipment device using, forexample, a web browser, a media guidance application, a desktopapplication, a mobile application, and/or any combination of accessapplications of the same. The user equipment device may be a cloudclient that relies on cloud computing for application delivery, or theuser equipment device may have some functionality without access tocloud resources. For example, some applications running on the userequipment device may be cloud applications, i.e., applications deliveredas a service over the Internet, while other applications may be storedand run on the user equipment device. In some embodiments, a user devicemay receive content from multiple cloud resources simultaneously. Forexample, a user device can stream audio from one cloud resource whiledownloading content from a second cloud resource. Or a user device candownload content from multiple cloud resources for more efficientdownloading. In some embodiments, user equipment devices can use cloudresources for processing operations such as the processing operationsperformed by processing circuitry described in relation to FIG. 4 . Insome embodiments, the cloud resources may include data sources such asRSS feeds, social media sources, news sources, or other sources that areupdated at a more frequent interval than conventional media guidancedata. For example, the cloud resources may provide data (e.g.,javascript object notation (JSON) data, or any other suitable dataformat) for sporting events and may be queried and retrieved by userequipment devices 402, 404, and 406.

As referred herein, the term “in response to” refers to initiated as aresult of. For example, a first action being performed in response to asecond action may include interstitial steps between the first actionand the second action. As referred herein, the term “directly inresponse to” refers to caused by. For example, a first action beingperformed directly in response to a second action may not includeinterstitial steps between the first action and the second action.

FIG. 6 is a flowchart of illustrative steps of a process 600 formanaging user subscriptions to content sources in accordance with someembodiments of the disclosure. It should be noted that process 600 orany step thereof could be performed on, or provided by, any of thedevices shown in FIGS. 4-5 . For example, process 600 may be executed bycontrol circuitry 404 (FIG. 4 ) as instructed by a media guidanceapplication implemented on a user device (e.g., user equipment devices502, 504, and/or 506 (FIG. 5 )) in order to manage user subscriptions tocontent sources. In addition, one or more steps of process 600 may beincorporated into or combined with one or more steps of any otherprocess or embodiment (e.g., as described in relation to FIGS. 1 and7-14 ).

At step 602, control circuitry 404 stores, in storage 408, a pluralityof content source bundles. The content source bundles may be retrievedfrom media content source 516, wherein a first content source bundleincludes a first subset of a plurality of content sources and a secondcontent bundle includes a second subset of the plurality of contentsources.

At step 604, control circuitry 404 determines that a user has asubscription to the first content source bundle, wherein thesubscription enables the user to access the first subset of contentsources in the first content source bundle. The subscription informationof the user can be retrieved from the media guidance data source 518.Furthermore, the user may log in to the user account via the user inputinterface 410 through the I/O path 402 to access and confirm thesubscription.

At step 606, control circuitry 404 monitors viewing habits of the userrelative to the first subset of content sources in the first contentsource bundle. Control circuitry 404 may retrieve the user's viewinginformation, such as time of access, duration of access, and contentmetadata from the media guidance data source 518. The user may viewcontent using user television equipment 502, user computer equipment504, or a wireless user communications device 506. Viewing history ofthe user may be placed in storage 408.

At step 608, control circuitry 404 modifies the first content sourcebundle to add a first content source from the second subset of thecontent sources in the second content source bundle based on the viewinghabits of the user. Control circuitry 404 may refer to the user profilein storage 408 and compare the user's viewing history with content froma first content source from the second subset of content sources in themedia content source 516. Specifically, control circuitry 404 maycompare the content metadata from the user's viewing history with thecontent metadata from the media guidance data source 518 that isassociated with the first content source to determine if there is amatch.

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 6 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 6 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 4-5 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 6 .

Consider a scenario in which a user has subscribed to a first contentsource bundle (e.g., basic cable package) with four content sources(e.g., channels) including FOX, ABC, CNN, and Comedy Central. Thecontent provider (e.g., Cablevision) may allow the user to access thesecontent sources on his/her mobile device or a set-top box. The contentprovider may also have a second content source bundle that contains fourcontent sources including HBO, MLB Network, CNN, and History Channel.The user may prefer viewing content on a mobile device on weekdays andon a set-top box on weekends. The user may limit his/her viewing per dayto two hours between 8:00 pm and 10:00 pm. It is possible that the usermay spend the first hour watching CNN News every day, and may spend thefollowing hour switching channels and watching small segments of variouscontent. The user may also not view content Comedy Central.

FIG. 7 is a flowchart of illustrative steps of a process 700 formanaging user subscriptions to content sources in accordance with someembodiments of the disclosure. It should be noted that process 700 orany step thereof could be performed on, or provided by, any of thedevices shown in FIGS. 4-5 . For example, process 700 may be executed bycontrol circuitry 404 (FIG. 4 ) as instructed by a media guidanceapplication implemented on a user device (e.g., user equipment devices502, 504, and/or 506 (FIG. 5 )) in order to manage user subscriptions tocontent sources. In addition, one or more steps of process 700 may beincorporated into or combined with one or more steps of any otherprocess or embodiment (e.g., as described in relation to FIGS. 1, 6 and8-14 ).

At step 702, control circuitry 404 stores a plurality of content sourcebundles in storage 408 wherein a first content source bundle includes afirst subset of a plurality of content sources and a second contentsource bundle includes a second subset of the plurality of contentsources. For example, the plurality of content source bundles may bevarious packages that a content provider (e.g., Cablevision) may offerto users through the media content source 516 (e.g., basic cablepackage, silver package, gold package, etc.). The plurality of contentsources may be all the channels that a content provider offers (e.g.,HBO, FOX, ABC, CNN, etc.). Therefore, a subset of the plurality ofcontent sources may be a selection of the plurality of content sourcesthat is a part of the content source bundle. For example, FOX, ABC, andCNN may be a subset of the plurality of content sources (e.g., HBO, FOX,ABC, CNN, etc.) and may be included in a content bundle (e.g., basiccable package).

At step 704, control circuitry 404 determines that a user has asubscription to the first content bundle, wherein the subscriptionenables the user to access the first subset of content sources in thefirst content source bundle. Control circuitry 404 may retrieve the usersubscription information from the media guidance application 518 and theuser profile accessible from storage 408. As stated in the example, theuser may have a subscription to the first content source bundle, thebasic cable package. Accordingly, the user is enabled access to fourcontent sources: FOX, ABC, CNN and Comedy Central.

At step 706, control circuitry 404 monitors the viewing habits of theuser relative to the first subset of content sources in the firstcontent source bundle. Viewing habits may be monitored using varioussources such as the media guidance data source 518, which may providemetadata associated with the content viewed by the user (e.g., from themedia content source 516). As stated in the example, the user may accesscontent from a set-top box (e.g., user television equipment 502) or amobile device (e.g., user computer equipment 504 and wireless usercommunications device 506). In terms of mobile devices, the user may usea laptop or a smartphone. Viewing habit information may include theequipment used to access content. It may also include informationregarding the content the user has already viewed. For example, themedia guidance application may track the viewing history of the userrelative to the first content bundle and place this information instorage 408. Control circuitry 404 may additionally monitor how oftenthe user accesses the content sources and the time spent on each. Forexample, control circuitry 404 may determine that the user views contentin the first content source bundle between 8:00 pm and 10:00 pm on adaily basis. Control circuitry 404 may track that the user spends thefirst hour watching CNN News every day, and spends the following hourswitching channels and watching small segments of various content. Theuser may also not view content on Comedy Central. Control circuitry maystore the user's viewing history in the user profile in storage 408.

At step 708, control circuitry 404 identifies, based on the viewinghabits, a viewing schedule of the user associated with a first contentsource of the content sources in the first content source bundle. Forexample, after monitoring the viewing habits of the user, it maydetermine that the user views content in the first content source bundlebetween 8:00 pm and 10:00 pm on a daily basis. Control circuitry 404 maytrack that the user spends the first hour watching CNN News every day.Therefore, the content CNN News, which is transmitted on the contentsource CNN, is part of the viewing schedule. Control circuitry 404 maytrack that the user spends the following hour switching channels. Thismay indicate that the user does not have a rigid viewing schedulebetween 9:00 pm and 10:00 pm. For example, the user may watch content onABC for ten minutes, switch to FOX for five minutes and then viewcontent on CNN again for twenty minutes before switching channels again.It is possible that the user may change the order and duration of accessper day. Control circuitry may determine that there is no definedviewing schedule due to the spontaneous nature of the user's viewinghistory between 9:00 pm and 10:00 pm. Control circuitry 404 may trackthat the user does not view content on Comedy Central. The viewingschedule may be placed in storage 408.

At step 710, control circuitry 404 searches, based on a user profile,for a given plurality of content sources that are in the second subsetof the plurality of content sources and are not in the first subset ofthe plurality of content sources and that match the user profile of theuser. As stated in the example, suppose that the second content sourcebundle is the silver package which contains content sources: HBO, MLBNetwork, CNN, and History Channel. Control circuitry 404 may determinethat the user's first content source bundle includes FOX, ABC, CNN, andComedy Central. In comparison to the first content source package, thesecond content source bundle may include three unique content sources:HBO, MLB Network, and History Channel. Control circuitry 404 mayretrieve the user profile from storage 408 to determine whether theseunique content sources match the user profile. Based on the user'sviewing history, control circuitry 404 may determine that the userprimarily views CNN News on CNN. From the media guidance data source518, control circuitry 404 may retrieve metadata associated with CNNNews. Metadata may include, but is not limited to, content description,schedule, subtitles, genre information, anchor names, etc. Based on themetadata, control circuitry 404 may determine that CNN News isassociated with politics, business, government, and history and addthese genres to the user's preferences in the user profile. Controlcircuitry 404 may repeat the metadata analysis process for each of theunique content sources, respectively. The analysis may indicate thatHistory Channel is associated with history, politics and government.Therefore, History Channel matches the user profile and is part of thegiven plurality of content sources.

At step 712, control circuitry 404 identifies content transmitted by thegiven plurality of content sources that match the user profile. Forexample, the content may be a television show, a movie, a sports game,etc., that is featured on the content source. Suppose that controlcircuitry 404 determines that History Channel is a content source thatis not a part of the user's first content source bundle and matches theuser profile (e.g., part of the given plurality of content sources).Control circuitry 404 may identify the content “History of US Politics”that is featured on History Channel. It may further determine that thecontent matches the user's preference because the content is associatedwith politics and government.

At step 714, control circuitry 404 determines a transmission schedule(e.g., from the media guidance data source 518) of the identifiedcontent. For example, “History of US Politics” may be a weeklydocumentary series that may discuss various political eras and leadersin the United States. The media guidance application may determine thatthe show is transmitted on History Channel every day between 9:30 pm and10:00 pm.

At step 716, control circuitry 404 compares the transmission schedule ofthe identified content with the viewing schedule of the user. Theviewing schedule of the user may be retrieved from storage 408. Forexample, control circuitry 404 may determine that the user watches CNNNews between 8:00 pm and 9:00 pm on a daily basis based on the viewingschedule. However, the user may not have a defined viewing schedulebetween 9:00 pm and 10:00 pm.

At step 718, control circuitry 404 selects a second content source ofthe given plurality of content sources based on the comparison. Forexample, upon determining that the transmission schedule of “History ofUS Politics” and the viewing schedule of the user between 9:30 pm and10:00 pm do not conflict, control circuitry 404 may select HistoryChannel.

At step 720, control circuitry 404 modifies the first content sourcebundle to add the selected second content source. For example, controlcircuitry 404 may add History Channel to the user's first content sourcebundle. This may be executed by enabling the user to access HistoryChannel and updating the user's subscription located in storage 408.

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 7 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 7 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 4-5 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 7 .

FIG. 8 is a flowchart of illustrative steps of a process 800 fordetermining user subscription to a content source bundle in accordancewith some embodiments of the disclosure. It should be noted that process800 or any step thereof could be performed on, or provided by, any ofthe devices shown in FIGS. 4-5 . For example, process 800 may beexecuted by control circuitry 404 (FIG. 4 ) as instructed by a mediaguidance application implemented on a user device (e.g., user equipmentdevices 502, 504, and/or 506 (FIG. 5 )) in order to determine usersubscription to a content source bundle. In addition, one or more stepsof process 800 may be incorporated into or combined with one or moresteps of any other process or embodiment (e.g., as described in relationto FIGS. 1, 6, 7 and 9-14 ).

At step 802, control circuitry retrieves from the user profile (e.g.,from storage 408), subscription metadata. The subscription metadata mayinclude information such as the content source bundle name and the listof content sources that the user can access. The subscription metadatamay further indicate the cost of the content source bundle and whetherthe content source bundle has been modified by control circuitry 404.

At step 804, control circuitry 404 determines that a user has asubscription to the first content bundle, wherein the subscriptionenables the user to access the first subset of content sources in thefirst content source bundle. For example, the user may have asubscription to the first content source bundle, the basic cablepackage. The subscription may indicate that the user can access thecontent sources: FOX, ABC, CNN, and Comedy Central.

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 8 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 8 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 4-5 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 8 .

FIG. 9 is a flowchart of illustrative steps of a process 900 foridentifying content that matches the user profile in accordance withsome embodiments of the disclosure. It should be noted that process 900or any step thereof could be performed on, or provided by, any of thedevices shown in FIGS. 4-5 . For example, process 900 may be executed bycontrol circuitry 404 (FIG. 4 ) as instructed by a media guidanceapplication implemented on a user device (e.g., user equipment devices502, 504, and/or 506 (FIG. 5 )) in order to identify content thatmatches the user profile. In addition, one or more steps of process 900may be incorporated into or combined with one or more steps of any otherprocess or embodiment (e.g., as described in relation to FIGS. 1, 6-8,and 10-14 ).

At step 902, the media guidance application begins the process ofsearching, based on a user profile, for a given plurality of contentsources that are in the second subset of the plurality of contentsources and are not in the first subset of the plurality of contentsources and that match the user profile of the user. For example,control circuitry 404 may attempt to find channels that are not a partof the user's basic cable package but may be related to the user'spreferences. The user profile may contain information such as the user'sviewing history, location history, search queries, time of access,duration of access, device usage, etc.

At step 904, control circuitry 404 retrieves a content source from thegiven plurality of content sources that are in the second subset of theplurality of content sources. For example, control circuitry 404 mayrefer to storage 408 to retrieve a content source that is associatedwith the second content source bundle that the user is not subscribedto.

At step 906, control circuitry 404 determines whether the content sourceis in the first subset of the plurality of content sources. For example,control circuitry 404 may question whether CNN, MLB Network, HBO andHistory Channel are a part of the user's first content source bundleoffered by the content provider.

At step 908, control circuitry 404 decides whether the content source isin the first subset of the plurality of content sources. For example,control circuitry 404 may refer to storage 408 and determine that theuser has a subscription that enables access to view content on CNN.Therefore, CNN is in the first subset of the plurality of contentsources. In response, the process returns to step 904 to identifyanother content source. Control circuitry 404 may, however, determinethat MLB Network is a content source that is not in the user's firstcontent source bundle.

In response to determining that the content source is not in the firstplurality of content streams, control circuitry 404 retrieves (e.g.,from storage 408) the user profile at step 910. Suppose that the userviews content on his/her mobile device (e.g., smartphone). Thesmartphone may store the location history of the user. For example, theuser may visit several baseball games at stadiums within a week. Thesmartphone may also track the user's browsing history or social media.For example, the user may search the Internet for information aboutplayer statistics or like/post content associated with baseball.

At step 912, control circuitry 404 determines whether the content sourcematches the user profile. For example, from the media guidance datasource 518, control circuitry 404 may retrieve metadata associated withMLB Network. Metadata may include, but is not limited to, contentdescription, schedule, subtitles, genre information, player names, etc.Based on the metadata, control circuitry 404 may determine that MLBNetwork is associated with baseball, athletics, stadiums and teams.Control circuitry 404 may determine that the user profile indicates thatthe user preference includes content associated with baseball based onthe user location and browsing history. Therefore, the content sourceMLB Network matches the user profile. If the content source did notmatch the user profile, the process would return to step 904.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may identify asecond content source based on the ratings and popularity of the secondcontent source. For example, control circuitry 404 may search forcontent that is popular (i.e., highly watched and highly rated byviewers). For example, the media guidance application may refer to theInternet to retrieve content ratings and viewership sizes or the mediaguidance data source 518. The media guidance application may refer to athreshold rating and a threshold viewership size in storage 408 todetermine if the content is popular (i.e., determines that the content'srating and viewership size exceed the respective thresholds). Forexample, suppose that the media guidance application determines that thecontent “Game of Thrones,” which is featured on the content source HBO,has a content rating of 4.5 out of 5 and has a viewership size of 10million daily viewers. If the threshold rating is 4 out of 5 and thethreshold viewership size is 5 million daily viewers, the media guidanceapplication may determine that “Game of Thrones” is a popular show. Themedia guidance application may then determine that HBO is not a part ofthe user's first content source bundle and select HBO as the contentsource.

In response to determining that the content source matches the userprofile, control circuitry 404 identifies the content source transmittedby the given plurality of content sources that matches the user profile.For example, control circuitry 404 may identify MLB Network as a contentsource that is not in the user's first content source bundle and matchesthe user profile.

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 9 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 9 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 4-5 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 9 .

FIG. 10 is a flowchart of illustrative steps of a process 1000 forselecting the second content source in accordance with some embodimentsof the disclosure. It should be noted that process 1000 or any stepthereof could be performed on, or provided by, any of the devices shownin FIGS. 4-5 . For example, process 1000 may be executed by controlcircuitry 404 (FIG. 4 ) as instructed by a media guidance applicationimplemented on a user device (e.g., user equipment devices 502, 504,and/or 506 (FIG. 5 )) in order to select the second content source. Inaddition, one or more steps of process 1000 may be incorporated into orcombined with one or more steps of any other process or embodiment(e.g., as described in relation to FIGS. 1, 6-9, and 11-14 ).

At step 1002, control circuitry 404 retrieves scheduling informationspecifying a transmission schedule of each media asset (e.g., contentsuch as a television show) transmitted by the given plurality of contentsources (e.g., content sources that match the user profile and are notin the first content source bundle). This information may be retrievedfrom the media guidance data source 518. For example, control circuitry404 may identify a media asset “Daily MLB,” which is transmitted on MLBNetwork and “Game of Thrones,” which is transmitted on HBO, and “Historyof US Politics,” which is transmitted on History Channel. The mediaassets are a part of the given plurality of content sources because HBO,MLB Network and History Channel are not in the first content sourcebundle. Furthermore, the media guidance data source 518 may indicatethat the daily transmission schedules of the media assets are 9:00 pm to9:30 pm, 10:00 pm to 11:00 pm and 9:30 pm to 10:00 pm, respectively.

At step 1004, control circuitry 404 determines whether the transmissionschedule of the identified content transmitted by the second contentsource overlaps with the viewing schedule of the user associated withthe content sources in the first content source bundle. For example, theviewing schedule of the user (e.g., retrieved from user profile instorage 408) may indicate that the user watches CNN News every daybetween 8:00 pm and 9:00 pm. Furthermore, it may indicate that the userdoes not show any specific show between 9:00 pm and 10:00 pm and oftenjumps between different content sources for short periods of time (e.g.,user may be uninterested in the content). Control circuitry 404 maycompare the viewing schedule with each of the transmission schedules ofthe media assets.

At step 1006, control circuitry 404 decides whether or not thetransmission schedule of the identified content overlaps with theviewing schedule. For example, control circuitry 404 may determine that“Daily MLB,” “Game of Thrones,” and “History of US Politics” do notconflict with the user's viewing schedule. In some cases, the mediaasset may have a re-run schedule. For example, “Daily MLB” may air thesame episode at a later time period (e.g., 11:00 pm to 11:30 pm).Control circuitry 404 may identify, based on metadata from the mediaguidance data source 518, that the second transmission is the samecontent (e.g., metadata for both transmissions may have the same episodenumber). In response, control circuitry 404 may consider thetransmission schedule that does not overlap with the viewing schedule ofthe user.

In response to determining that the transmission schedule of theidentified content does not overlap with the viewing schedule, controlcircuitry may select the second content source at step 1014. Forexample, control circuitry 404 may select HBO, MLB Network and HistoryChannel because they each feature content that matches the user profile.

In response to determine that the transmission schedule of theidentified content overlaps with the viewing schedule, the controlcircuitry 404 prompts the user to confirm selection of the secondcontent source. For example, the prompt may be presented to the user onthe display 412 as a user input interface 410. The prompt may come inthe form of FIG. 1 's display screen 100. The user may have the “Yes” or“No” options or a selectable option (e.g., the user may click on thecontent sources he/she wishes to select).

At step 1010, control circuitry 404 retrieves the user's confirmation.The user's response may be sent through the I/O path 402. The user mayeither have selected “Yes” or “No” or selected a content source on thedisplay.

At step 1012, control circuitry 404 determines whether the userconfirmed selection of the content source. For example, the user mayaccept MLB Network and History Channel. In response, the process entersstep 1014 and control circuitry 404 selects MLB Network and HistoryChannel. The user may also reject HBO. In response, the process entersstep 1016 and control circuitry 404 does not select HBO.

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 10 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 10 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 4-5 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 10 .

FIG. 11 is a flowchart of illustrative steps of a process 1100 formodifying the first content source bundle in accordance with someembodiments of the disclosure. It should be noted that process 1100 orany step thereof could be performed on, or provided by, any of thedevices shown in FIGS. 4-5 . For example, process 1100 may be executedby control circuitry 404 (FIG. 4 ) as instructed by a media guidanceapplication implemented on a user device (e.g., user equipment devices502, 504, and/or 506 (FIG. 5 )) in order to modify the first contentsource bundle. In addition, one or more steps of process 1100 may beincorporated into or combined with one or more steps of any otherprocess or embodiment (e.g., as described in relation to FIGS. 1, 6-10,and 12-14 ).

At step 1102, control circuitry 404 determines from which contentsources in the first content source bundle the user access contentfrequently. For example, the user profile from storage 408 may contain aviewing schedule of the user indicating that the user views CNN Newsevery day. The viewing schedule may also indicate that the user does notview content on Comedy Central.

At step 1104, control circuitry 404 may determine that a percentage ofthe content sources in the first content source bundle viewed by theuser is less than a threshold. For example, the user may be subscribedto the basic cable package. Suppose that the basic cable packagecontains four content sources (e.g., channels). The user may only beaccessing one channel and may choose not to access the remainingchannels because the respective content of the latter is not of interestto the user. Therefore, the media guidance application may determinefrom the viewing schedule of the user that only 25% of the channels arebeing accessed.

At step 1106, control circuitry 404 decides whether the percentage ofthe content sources in the first content bundle viewed by the user isless than the threshold. Suppose that the threshold (e.g., retrievedfrom storage 408) is set to 60%. Control circuitry 404 may determinethat the user's percentage of access is only 25%, which is less than60%.

In response to determining that the percentage is less than thethreshold, control circuitry 404 modifies the first content sourcebundle. The media guidance application may determine that because theuser only views 25% of the first content source bundle, a value lessthan the 60% threshold, the first content source bundle needs to bemodified. As discussed previously, modifying a content source bundle mayinvolve adding content sources, removing content sources, or swappingcontent sources from other content source bundles. In other words,process 700 may be initiated to execute a modification. Suppose thatcontrol circuitry 404 has selected a second content source as acandidate to add to the user's first content source bundle. Continuingfrom the example described in FIG. 10 , the user may confirm selectionof MLB Network and History Channel. In response, control circuitry 404may update the user's subscription metadata by enabling user access toMLB Network and History Channel and storing the updated subscriptionmetadata in storage 408. In response to determining that the percentageof the content sources in the first bundle viewed by the user exceedsthe threshold, the process returns to step 1102 and control circuitry404 determines the percentage again.

At step 1110, control circuitry 404 removes a third content source fromthe first subset of the first content source bundle based on themodification to the first content source bundle. In the previousexample, it was noted that the user does not access Comedy Central andcontent featured on Comedy Central is not a part of the user's viewingschedule. In response, the media guidance application may remove ComedyCentral from the user's first content source bundle. Control circuitry404 may update the user's subscription metadata by disabling user accessto Comedy Central and storing the updated subscription metadata instorage 408.

At step 1112, control circuitry 404 adjusts the first cost based onmodifying the first content source bundle. The first content sourcebundle is associated with a first cost and the second content sourcebundle is associated with a second cost. Cost information may beretrieved from the media guidance data source 518. For example, supposethat the content provider charges $40 monthly for the first contentsource bundle. Suppose that each content source (e.g., channel) costs$10. Therefore, adding a content source to the content source bundleincreases the monthly cost by $10 and removing a content source reducesthe monthly cost by $5. In the given scenario, adding History Channeland MLB Network to the user's first content source bundle increases themonthly cost to $60. If control circuitry 404 removes Comedy Central,the monthly cost reduces to $50.

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 11 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 11 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 4-5 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 11 .

FIG. 12 is a flowchart of illustrative steps of a process 1200 forenabling a second user to subscribe to the modified first content sourcebundle in accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure. It shouldbe noted that process 1200 or any step thereof could be performed on, orprovided by, any of the devices shown in FIGS. 4-5 . For example,process 1200 may be executed by control circuitry 404 (FIG. 4 ) asinstructed by a media guidance application implemented on a user device(e.g., user equipment devices 502, 504, and/or 506 (FIG. 5 )) in orderto enable a second user to subscribe to the modified first contentsource bundle. In addition, one or more steps of process 1200 may beincorporated into or combined with one or more steps of any otherprocess or embodiment (e.g., as described in relation to FIGS. 1, 6-11and 13-14 ).

At step 1202, control circuitry 404 characterizes the user based on theviewing habits. For example, the user's viewing schedule (e.g.,retrieved from storage 408) may include the news, baseball, anddocumentaries. The media guidance application may characterize the useras a fan of baseball, sports, politics, and history. Furthermore, theuser's first content source bundle may be a modified first contentbundle that includes MLB Network, CNN, MLB Network, FOX, and ABC.

At step 1204, control circuitry 404 identifies a second user based onthe characterization of the user. For example, control circuitry 404search the user profile in storage 408 to access information about theuser's social network. The social network may indicate a second user(e.g., user's friend/relative) who has similar interests and likes/postssimilar content on social media. For example, control circuitry 404 maydetermine that the second user can be characterized as a fan of baseballbecause the second user posts content about baseball on social media. Itshould be noted that control circuitry 404 may also identify a seconduser who is not connected to the user.

At step 1206, control circuitry 404 enables the second user to subscribeto the modified first content source bundle in response to identifyingthe second user based on the characterization. For example, the seconduser may be shown the display screen 100 from FIG. 1 on his/her owndisplay 412. In some embodiments, the content source bundle 120 may havean identifier labeled “based on users with similar interests.”Furthermore, the content sources listed below the identifier may be apart of the user's modified first content source bundle. The second usermay then select the modified first content source bundle.

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 12 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 12 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 4-5 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 12 .

FIG. 13 is a flowchart of illustrative steps of a process 1300 foridentifying a viewing schedule of the user associated with a firstcontent source in accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure. Itshould be noted that process 1300 or any step thereof could be performedon, or provided by, any of the devices shown in FIGS. 4-5 . For example,process 1300 may be executed by control circuitry 404 (FIG. 4 ) asinstructed by a media guidance application implemented on a user device(e.g., user equipment devices 502, 504, and/or 506 (FIG. 5 )) in orderto identify a viewing schedule of the user associated with a firstcontent source. In addition, one or more steps of process 1300 may beincorporated into or combined with one or more steps of any otherprocess or embodiment (e.g., as described in relation to FIGS. 1, 6-12,and 14 ).

At step 1302, control circuitry 404 retrieves the user profile (e.g.,from storage 408) to access the user's viewing history. The user'sviewing history may include for example, the content the user hasviewed, the content sources accessed by the user, the time of access,the duration of access, the method of access, etc.

At step 1304, control circuitry 404 analyzes the user's viewing historyfor trends and preferences. The media guidance application may have arecurrence threshold to determine if an activity counts as a trend. Forexample, if a given activity is repeated more than a specific number oftimes in a given period of time, the media guidance application mayclassify the activity with a trend. For example, if the user accesses acontent stream every day for five consecutive days and the dailyrecurrence threshold (e.g., minimum daily activity) is two, controlcircuitry 404 may determine that the user has a trend of accessing thecontent stream twice on a daily basis.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may search forrecurring access at specific times. For example, the viewing history mayindicate that the user has viewed content every Monday evening at 8:00pm in a given month. Control circuitry 404 may thus determine that theuser has a weekly trend of viewing content on Monday at 8:00 pm. In someembodiments, the media guidance application may search for recurringaccess of specific content. For example, control circuitry 404 maydetermine, based on the viewing history, that the user has viewed “CNNNews” once per day in a given week and may determine that the user has adaily trend of accessing “CNN News.” In some embodiments, the mediaguidance application may search for media settings associated with theviewing history of the user to determine user preference of settings.For example, control circuitry 404 may determine that the user viewedall content (e.g., five different shows) with the audio set to Spanish,and identify the trend that the user prefers the audio set to Spanish.

At step 1306, control circuitry 404 identifies a viewing schedule of theuser associated with a first content source of the content sources inthe first content source bundle. For example, after monitoring theviewing habits of the user (e.g., analyzing the user's viewing history),control circuitry 404 may determine that the user views content in thefirst content source bundle between 8:00 pm and 10:00 pm on a dailybasis. Control circuitry 404 may track that the user spends the firsthour watching “CNN News” every day. Therefore, the content “CNN News,”which is transmitted on the content source CNN, is part of the viewingschedule.

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 13 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 13 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 4-5 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 13 .

FIG. 14 is a flowchart of illustrative steps of a process 1400 fordetermining a transmission schedule of the identified content inaccordance with some embodiments of the disclosure. It should be notedthat process 1400 or any step thereof could be performed on, or providedby, any of the devices shown in FIGS. 4-5 . For example, process 1400may be executed by control circuitry 404 (FIG. 4 ) as instructed by amedia guidance application implemented on a user device (e.g., userequipment devices 502, 504, and/or 506 (FIG. 5 )) in order to determinea transmission schedule of the identified content. In addition, one ormore steps of process 1400 may be incorporated into or combined with oneor more steps of any other process or embodiment (e.g., as described inrelation to FIGS. 1 and 6-13 ).

At step 1402, control circuitry 404 identifies content transmitted bythe given plurality of content sources that matches the user profile.For example, the content may be a television show, a movie, a sportsgame, etc., that is featured on the content source. Suppose that controlcircuitry 404 determines that History Channel is a content source thatis not a part of the user's first content source bundle and matches theuser profile (e.g., part of the given plurality of content sources).Control circuitry 404 may identify the content “History of US Politics”that is featured on History Channel. It may further determine that thecontent matches the user's preference because the content is associatedwith politics and government.

At step 1404, control circuitry 404 may retrieve metadata associatedwith the identified content from the media guidance data source 518.Metadata may include, but is not limited to, content description,schedule, subtitles, genre information, etc. For example, the metadataof “History of US Politics” may include a description of the episode,the episode number, the actors in the show, and the show's dailyschedule.

At step 1406, control circuitry 404 determines a transmission scheduleof the identified content. For example, based on the metadata of Historyof US Politics,” control circuitry 404 may determine that the show istransmitted on History Channel between 9:30 pm and 10:00 pm on weekdays.

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 14 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 14 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 4-5 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 14 .

The processes discussed above are intended to be illustrative and notlimiting. One skilled in the art would appreciate that the steps of theprocesses discussed herein may be omitted, modified, combined, and/orrearranged, and any additional steps may be performed without departingfrom the scope of the invention. More generally, the above disclosure ismeant to be exemplary and not limiting. Only the claims that follow aremeant to set bounds as to what the present invention includes.Furthermore, it should be noted that the features and limitationsdescribed in any one embodiment may be applied to any other embodimentherein, and flowcharts or examples relating to one embodiment may becombined with any other embodiment in a suitable manner, done indifferent orders, or done in parallel. In addition, the systems andmethods described herein may be performed in real time. It should alsobe noted that the systems and/or methods described above may be appliedto, or used in accordance with, other systems and/or methods.

1-51. (canceled)
 52. A method for managing user subscriptions to contentsources, the method comprising: storing a plurality of content sourcebundles wherein, a first content source bundle includes a first subsetof a plurality of content sources and a second content source bundleincludes a second subset of the plurality of content sources;determining that a user has a subscription to the first content sourcebundle, wherein the subscription enables the user to access the firstsubset of content sources in the first content source bundle; searchingfor a first content source from the second subset of the plurality ofcontent sources in the second content source bundle; and modifying thefirst content source bundle to replace an infrequently viewed contentsource from the first subset of the plurality of content sources withthe first content source.
 53. The method of claim 52, the method furthercomprising identifying the first content source based on the matching ofthe first content source with a user profile relating to the user. 54.The method of claim 52, the method further comprising identifying thefirst content source based on the user's location.
 55. The method ofclaim 52, the method further comprising identifying the first contentsource based on the user's browsing history.
 56. The method of claim 52,the method further comprising identifying the first content source basedon the ratings and popularity of the first content source.
 57. Themethod of claim 52, the method further comprising monitoring viewinghabits of the user relative to the first subset of content sources inthe first content source bundle.
 58. The method of claim 57, the methodfurther comprising based on the monitoring, determining, for eachrespective content source of the content sources within the first subsetof the plurality of content sources, whether the respective contentsource is frequently viewed by the user.
 59. The method of claim 58, themethod further comprising: comparing a number of the content sourceswithin the first subset determined to be frequently viewed by the userto a total number of content sources within the first subset; and basedon the comparison, determining an aggregate percentage of the contentsources within the first subset of the plurality of content sources thatare frequently viewed by the user.
 60. The method of claim 59, themethod further comprising: determining whether the aggregate percentageis less than a threshold; and in response to determining that theaggregate percentage is less than the threshold, enabling the user tomodify the first content source bundle to add the first content sourcefrom the second subset of the content sources in the second contentsource bundle based on the viewing habits of the user.
 61. The method ofclaim 60, the method further comprising in response to determining thatthe aggregate percentage is less than the threshold, removing theinfrequently viewed content source from the first subset of the firstcontent source bundle based on the modification to the first contentsource bundle.
 62. A system for managing user subscriptions to contentsources, the system comprising control circuitry configured to: store aplurality of content source bundles wherein, a first content sourcebundle includes a first subset of a plurality of content sources and asecond content source bundle includes a second subset of the pluralityof content sources; determine that a user has a subscription to thefirst content source bundle, wherein the subscription enables the userto access the first subset of content sources in the first contentsource bundle; search for a first content source from the second subsetof the plurality of content sources in the second content source bundle;and modify the first content source bundle to replace an infrequentlyviewed content source from the first subset of the plurality of contentsources with the first content source.
 63. The system of claim 62,wherein the control circuitry is configured to identify the firstcontent source based on the matching of the first content source with auser profile relating to the user.
 64. The system of claim 62, whereinthe control circuitry is configured to identify the first content sourcebased on the user's location.
 65. The system of claim 62, wherein thecontrol circuitry is configured to identify the first content sourcebased on the user's browsing history.
 66. The system of claim 62,wherein the control circuitry is further configured to identify thefirst content source based on the ratings and popularity of the firstcontent source.
 67. The system of claim 62, wherein the controlcircuitry is further configured to monitor viewing habits of the userrelative to the first subset of content sources in the first contentsource bundle.
 68. The system of claim 67, wherein the control circuitryis further configured to, based on the monitoring, determine, for eachrespective content source of the content sources within the first subsetof the plurality of content sources, whether the respective contentsource is frequently viewed by the user.
 69. The system of claim 68,wherein the control circuitry is further configured to: compare a numberof the content sources within the first subset determined to befrequently viewed by the user to a total number of content sourceswithin the first subset; and based on the comparison, determine anaggregate percentage of the content sources within the first subset ofthe plurality of content sources that are frequently viewed by the user.70. The system of claim 69, wherein the control circuitry is furtherconfigured to: determine whether the aggregate percentage is less than athreshold; and in response to determining that the aggregate percentageis less than the threshold, enable the user to modify the first contentsource bundle to add the first content source from the second subset ofthe content sources in the second content source bundle based on theviewing habits of the user.
 71. The system of claim 70, wherein thecontrol circuitry is further configured to, in response to determiningthat the aggregate percentage is less than the threshold, remove theinfrequently viewed content source from the first subset of the firstcontent source bundle based on the modification to the first contentsource bundle.